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Protection Society

President :

CHARLES ROBERTS, Esq.

Chairman of General Committee:

LORD HENRY CAVENDISH-BENTINCK, M.P.

Vice-Chairman of General Committee :

Treasurers:

E. WRIGHT BROOKS, Esq., J.P.
SIR T. FOWELL BUXTON, BART.

Secretary:

TRAVERS BUXTON, M.A.

Organizing Secretary:

JOHN H. HARRIS.

Hon. Lecturer :

MRS. JOHN H. HARRIS.

Chairman of Parliamentary Committee:

RIGHT HON. J. W. WILSON, M.P.

Bankers:

BARCLAY'S BANK, LTD.

95 Victoria Street, S.W.1.

Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner, Frome and Londer

The

LIBRARIES
STACKS

OCT 2 7 1970

Anti-Slavery Reporter

and Aborigines' Friend

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Published under the sanction and at the Offices of

The Anti-Slavery & Aborigines Protection Society

51 Denison House, Vauxhall Bridge Road

London, S.W.I

JANUARY, 1920.

[The Editor, whilst grateful to all correspondents who may be kind enough to furnish him with information, desires to state that he is not responsible for the views stated by them, nor for quotations which may be inserted from other journals. The object of the journal is to spread information, and articles are necessarily quoted which may contain views or statements for which their authors can alone be held responsible.]

Rhodesia.

Quarterly Motes.

THE Society is actively following up this question upon which appeals are being made to the Government on behalf of the National Free Church Council, and also, it is hoped, from influential quarters in the Anglican Church.

Attention is directed to questions and answers in the House of Commons, reported on another page, relating to the Native Reserves Commission of 1917, and to Lord Cave's Commission now sitting in London, after completing its inquiries in South Africa, to investigate the claims of the Chartered Company; the Society is giving evidence before the Commission through Mr. J. H. Harris. The speeches of the Attorney-General on the responsibility of the Company for the Matabele Wars are of considerable significance. There is much material in the Society's office bearing on the Rhodesia question, and information will be readily sent to any persons interested who care to communicate with the Secretary.

South African
Natives.

THE Committee and Secretaries have kept in touch with the members of the deputation from the Native National Congress, which came to this country to urge upon the Government the disabilities and injustice from which the natives of the Union are suffering in regard to their land, the pass laws, etc. Unfortunately the deputation have obtained little satisfaction from the Colonial Office.

In connection with the deplorable incident of the forcible removal from the Edinburgh Castle in September of two of the delegates and two other natives who were returning to South Africa (upon which questions and answers in Parliament are reported on a later page), a letter was sent to the Press mentioning the steps which have been taken on behalf of the Society to maintain the four men and provide for their comfort while detained in this country for many weeks. The Committee communicated with the High Commissioner for South Africa in London as soon as the incident occurred, and with him arrangements were made for securing board. and lodging, necessary new clothes, and also passages on another ship. Passages were eventually found for the men early in December, when three of the men started for their homes.

94

Native Trade in Palm kernels.

PUBLIC MEETING.

A MEETING of protest against the export duty on palm kernels and restrictions on the export of West African produce was called by the Society at the Caxton Hall on November 19, its object being " to insist upon the right of native races to dispose of their produce in the Open Markets of the World."

In the unavoidable absence of Earl Beauchamp (owing to the visit. of Prince Arthur of Connaught to Dover) the chair was occupied by the Rt. Hon. J. W. Wilson, M.P., who was supported by Lord Emmott, Mr. P. A. Molteno, Mr. Thomas Wiles, Mr. B. Spoor, M.P., and Sir Sydney Olivier. Others present included Sir C. J. Tarring, Hon. Geo. Peel, Mr. G. P. Gooch, Mr. A. H. Scott, and the Treasurers and Secretaries of the Society.

The Organizing Secretary, Mr. J. H. Harris, read a message from Sir Harry Johnston, who wrote:

"I am sorry I cannot attend the meeting summoned to discuss the differential duties which are to be placed on our West African produce. This policy is one on which the whole nation and Empire should be consulted. If entered upon, it must be with the full knowledge of what it may lead to, i.e., trouble with the Native races, and serious dissatisfaction on the part of other European, American and Asiatic Powers, not themselves endowed with African territory. Already it is causing the French Government to return to a policy of Protection and differentiation in French Possessions, which was one of the root causes of the late great war. We on our part must never forget that we were tacitly permitted by the rest of the civilized world to accumulate an Empire of over 13,000,000 square miles, on the understanding that it was to be an Empire based on the principle of complete freedom of trade. A departure from this principle might lead to such serious results that we should only enter on it realizing the enmities we may have to face in the future."

The CHAIRMAN said that the question could be approached from many different points of view. It was plausibly claimed that the new policy allowed foodstuffs or raw materials to come to this country on better terms than those on which they entered other countries. The Society wished to emphasize that the policy imposed a condition of dictation and limitation, and almost of bondage, in our Colonial Empire upon our native fellow subjects. We did not want the country to be committed to it in direct antagonism to the wishes of the native populations in these vast territories, without realizing how fraught it was with mischief and complications for the future. The proposals were the very opposite of Colonial Preference, because they put the colonies at a disadvantage by limiting their trade, and it played into the hands of large trusts and corporations which controlled the soap and margarine markets. This might form a very bad

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precedent. From a wider point of view, the policy could be opposed under the Treaty of Paris. If, as a Mandatory State we were to claim to pass special legislation irrespective of the interest of the inhabitants of the colonies, it was setting a terrible example to our Allies and would hamper the early work of the League of Nations, which was the one hope of the peace of the world.

Sir T. F. BUXTON then moved the following resolution on behalf of the Society:

"That in the opinion of this meeting the Native Races of the Dependencies of the British Empire have hitherto enjoyed in time of peace the right to dispose of their raw produce as they choose in the markets of the world, and that any departure from this policy forced upon them by His Majesty's Government may prove a serious danger to their prosperity and contentment, and to the security of the British Commonwealth.

That this meeting urges upon His Majesty's Government that sound Colonial policy demands the early restoration to the Natives of West Africa of their right to dispose of their produce as and where they will, and invites Members of Parliament and the public generally to use every constitutional means to secure a restoration of this undoubted right to the Natives of West Africa."

They, as a Society, Sir F. T. Buxton said, were concerned solely with the interests of the native population. They believed that these measures would work out definitely to the injury of the natives of our dependencies. Were we going now to introduce the new principle of exploiting the resources of these dependencies for our own benefit and particularly in the interests of a limited group of manufacturers in this country?

Lord EMMOTT, G.C.M.G., seconded the resolution and said that he should support Lord Beauchamp in bringing the question before the House of Lords.

There were two matters before them. There was the £2 palm kernel duty and there were also certain restrictions which were suddenly put on a day or two before the palm-kernel duty came into force. When the Colonial Office asked the Government of India to associate itself with a similar provision, that Government most contemptuously refused to be a party to any such action. He did not know what the real genesis of these restrictive proposals was. It was said that they had been suggested by the Ministry of Food. He did not, however, think there was any shortage of oils in this country which made it necessary from that point of view. The whole thing to him was a mystery, and it was their duty to demand some explanation of what these restrictions meant, and why they were imposed. They were said to be temporary. The £2 duty might be temporary if they and their friends were strong enough to get it removed;

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